Michael Field

Yea, gold is son of Zeus: no rust Its timeless light can stain; The worm that brings man's flesh to dust Assaults its strength in vain: More gold than gold the love I sing, A hard, inviolable thing. Men say the passions should grow old With waning years; my heart Is incorruptible as gold, 'Tis my immortal part: Nor is there any god can lay On love the finger of decay.

Βροδοπαχεες αγναι Χαριτες, δεντε Λιος κοραι Ye rosy-armed, pure Graces, come, Daughters of Zeus, be near! Oh, wherefore have my lips been dumb So long in silence drear? And why have I so cheerless been, So sorrowful and wild? It was because ye were not seen, Because ye had not smiled. Although his prayer the Muses bless, The poet doth require That ye, in frolic gentleness, Should stand beside his lyre. Ne’er will he mortal ear delight, Nor care-vex’d spirit ease; Except he sing with ye in sight, Rose-flushed among the trees.

O wind, thou hast thy kingdom in the trees, And all thy royalties Sweep through the land to-day. It is mid June, And thou, with all thy instruments in tune, Thine orchestra Of heaving fields and heavy swinging fir, Strikest a lay That doth rehearse Her ancient freedom to the universe. All other sound in awe Repeats its law: The bird is mute; the sea Sucks up its waves; from rain The burthened clouds refrain, To listen to thee in thy leafery, Thou unconfined, Lavish, large, soothing, refluent summer wind.

I Though I sing high, and chaunt above her, Praising my girl, It were not right To reckon her the poorer lover; She does not love me less For her royal, jewelled speechlessness, She is the sapphire, she the light, The music in the pearl. II Not from pert birds we learn the spring-tide From open sky. What speaks to us Closer than far distances that hide In woods, what is more dear Than a cherry-bough, bees feeding near In the soft, proffered blooms? Lo, I Am fed and honoured thus. III She has the star’s own pulse; its throbbing Is a quick light. She is a dove My soul draws to its breast; her sobbing Is for the warm dark there! In the heat of her wings I would not care My close-housed bird should take her flight To magnify our love.

The rooks are cawing  up and down the trees! Among their nests they caw. O sound I treasure, Ripe as old music is, the summer's measure, Sleep at her gossip, sylvan mysteries, With prate and clamour to give zest of these— In rune I trace the ancient law of pleasure, Of love, of all the busy-ness of leisure, With dream on dream of never-thwarted ease. O homely birds, whose cry is harbinger Of nothing sad, who know not anything Of sea-birds' loneliness, of Procne's strife, Rock round me when I die! So sweet it were To die by open doors, with you on wing Humming the deep security of life.

A Girl, Her soul a deep-wave pearl Dim, lucent of all lovely mysteries; A face flowered for heart’s ease, A brow’s grace soft as seas Seen through faint forest-trees: A mouth, the lips apart, Like aspen-leaflets trembling in the breeze From her tempestuous heart. Such: and our souls so knit, I leave a page half-writ — The work begun Will be to heaven’s conception done, If she come to it.

Mortal, if thou art beloved Life's offences are removed; All the fateful things that checked thee, Hearten, hallow, and protect thee. Grow'st thou mellow? What is age? Tinct on life's illumined page, Where the purple letters glow Deeper, painted long ago. What is sorrow? Comfort's prime, Love's choice Indian summer clime. Sickness!—thou wilt pray it worse For so blessed, balmy nurse. And for death! when thou art dying 'Twill be Love beside thee lying. Death is lonesome? Oh, how brave Shows the foot-frequented grave! Heaven itself is but the casket For Love's treasure, ere he ask it,— Ere with burning heart he follow, Piercing through corruption's hollow. If thou art beloved, oh then Fear no grief from mortal men.